


two tickets to paradise

by uhposey



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Fluff, M/M, a little bit of angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-23
Updated: 2014-02-23
Packaged: 2018-01-13 11:37:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1224853
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/uhposey/pseuds/uhposey
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Derek's going to South America and hey, so is Stiles. And wow, look, they sit next to each other on the plane. For nine hours. Could it be fate? Derek thinks it's probably just a terrible choice in seating - at first. Stiles can be...pretty persuasive.</p>
            </blockquote>





	two tickets to paradise

**8:00 AM**

 

It’s eight in the goddamn morning and Derek’s on a plane to South America. He has no idea where he went wrong. Answering Cora’s phone call last night? Encouraging Cora to follow her dream and live a continent away in the first place? Somewhere along that line.

God, he didn’t know people could even be this tired. He hasn’t gotten up before noon for the past three years, and it is an unwelcome change. He’s had three cups of coffee already, but still he feels like death and immense regret. Well, at least the good news is he’ll have a chance to sleep on the nine-hour nonstop flight.

“Morning!”

Fuck.

Derek opens one eye to see a lanky boy in an Evil Dead t-shirt standing in the aisle next to his seat. “Uh, I’ve got the window seat,” he says sheepishly.

At first Derek doesn’t understand what exactly he’s implying, but he quickly figures it out as the kid awkwardly maneuvers himself over Derek’s legs and into his seat. “God, these seats are small,” he mutters under his breath.

Derek couldn’t agree more.

 

**8:54 AM**

 

“I’m Stiles, by the way.”

Derek opens his eyes slowly. He’d been in the middle of a dream about river mermaids with the lower half of a crocodile. He’s not gonna say he welcomes the distraction, because he doesn’t entirely, but he doesn’t completely reject it either.

“I figure, we’re gonna be here for nine hours straight. Might as well know something about each other, right?” Stiles continues. “So, what’s your name?”

Derek raises his eyebrows slightly. “Derek,” he says finally.

What kind of name is Stiles? He resolves to talk as little as possible to Stiles, and he shows this by sinking lower into his seat and shutting his eyes.

 

**12:12 PM**

 

“ _Don't you dare get caviar, Scott. When God hands you a pizza delivery place ten minutes away from your house, you fucking take it."_

“ _Shit, man, you think I know anything about girls? …Your guess is as good as mine. If you think she’ll like magic tricks, then go with it.”_

“ _N’Sync is not cool anymore, Scott! …Yes, Justin Timberlake’s career is flourishing. …No, that doesn’t mean N’Sync is still cool. Stop it. I’m saying this as a friend, Scott. You’re embarrassing us all.”_

This is probably the weirdest dream Derek has ever had. He opens his eyes, blinking against the sunlight streaming in the window.

Next to him, Stiles has a cell phone up to his ear and is currently engaged in a heated discussion about what sounds like N’Sync. Well, that explains that.

“What’s going on?” Derek asks, his voice little more than a mumble.

Stiles waves his hand at him, listening to whoever is on the other end. “Christ, Scott. Listen, I gotta go. Just remember – pizza, movie, flowers. And don’t talk about N’Sync. Okay – okay, bye.” He hangs up and shoves the phone in his pocket. “Sorry, my buddy gets kinda weird about girls. There’s this girl Allison – ”

“How are you using your phone?” Derek interrupts.

“We stopped,” Stiles says, like it’s obvious.

Derek frowns at him. “This is a nonstop flight, why the hell did we stop?”

Stiles shrugs. “Engine trouble. I think we’re somewhere in Mexico,” he says dismissively.

“Mexico?” Derek repeats incredulously. “I don’t want to be in Mexico, I want to be in Peru.”

“Yeah, because I can change that,” Stiles says sarcastically, the corner of his lip quirked up. “Sorry, buddy, looks like we’re stuck here for a while. I don’t think they want us getting off the plane, either, so I’d try and get some more sleep if I were you.”

Derek groans, pulling his hood up over his head. He doesn’t think he can go back to sleep, but he’s sure as hell gonna try.

 

**12:47 PM**

 

He was right – sleep never came. Instead, he’s been sitting here listening to Stiles breathe and hum and tap his fingers against the window for the past half hour. It’s been oddly soothing, but Derek’s had enough of the silence.

“How old are you?” he asks bluntly.

Stiles looks over to him, surprised. “Uh, nineteen, why?”

Derek shrugs a little, suddenly feeling embarrassed that he asked. “You just seem really young.”

Stiles chuckles, a low sound that makes Derek want to hear more. “Yeah, I get that a lot,” he says with a shrug. He taps his fingers for a second. “So why are you going to South America, anyway?”

“My sister lives there,” Derek finds himself answering. He didn’t actually intend to say much of anything, but something about the look Stiles is giving him makes him want to answer. It’s like Stiles is interested in Derek’s every word – and that’s a nice feeling. Not something Derek experiences very often.

“Oh, that’s cool,” Stiles says with a nod. When he says it, it doesn’t sound like your regular disinterested ‘that’s cool.’ It sounds like he really means it; he genuinely thinks it’s cool that Cora lives in Peru. “I guess I’m sort of going to live there too.”

Derek raises an eyebrow at him. “Sort of?” he asks with a small smile.

Stiles looks at him for a moment, and Derek thinks he’s insulted him. But then Stiles just laughs, his shoulders relaxing as he leans back in his seat. “Yeah, I guess it sounds kinda dumb when you say it like that. I just – a lot of shit went down back at home, and I just needed to get out. And then they offered me a semester abroad, and I just said, what the hell?” He shrugs. “Pretty stupid, right?”

Derek chuckles, looking down at his lap. “No, I get it. That’s how I feel a lot of the time, too.”

There’s a long moment of silence while Derek desperately racks his brain for something, anything else to say. Thankfully, the speaker crackles to life and the pilot comes on. “Sorry for the delay folks, but we’re gonna get going now. So sit back and buckle up, and we should be in Peru in just a few hours.”

"Guess that’s the end for us, huh?" Stiles says with a dry smile.

Derek frowns. “What makes you say that?”

Stiles shrugs a little. “I saw that look you gave me earlier, like you can’t stand talking to me for even a second,” he says, dragging his finger along the arm of the seat. “I mean, I get it. You’re twenty-three and smokin’ hot. Why would you wanna waste your time talking to a stupid kid? The most I am to you is annoying, right?”

Derek can’t find anything to say to him, mostly because he’s right. Up until twenty minutes ago, he’d practically resented Stiles for the entire morning. But that was before he’d actually started talking to him. What the hell is he supposed to say to explain that?

The response comes in a way that is less than eloquent and entirely Derek stumbling over his own words in their desperate attempt to escape the confines of his mouth. “You think I’m hot?”

Fucking smooth.

He watches Stiles’ face go blank, completely shutting him out. He shakes his head, turning away in his seat and mumbling, “Just forget it.”

Cora always told him he was terrible with people. Her exact words may or may not have been ‘Just keep your mouth shut and let your pretty face do the talking.’

“Shit,” he says under his breath, cursing his big mouth. “Look, Stiles, I’m sorry. I thought that at first, but that was before I started talking to you!” He’s fully aware of how utterly pathetic he sounds, but he doesn’t care. He just wants Stiles to understand that he doesn’t think that anymore.

Stiles doesn’t turn around, his shoulders rigid and turned defiantly away from him.

Derek stares straight ahead at the seat in front of him, reading and rereading the airplane safety booklet crammed in the pocket. How could he have been so stupid? He replays the conversation a million times in his head, wincing every time he says something dumb or looks at Stiles like he’s a stupid kid. How could he have been so catastrophically wrong?

A quiet voice in his head that sounds an awful lot like Cora whispers, _Why do you care, anyway? What, do you like him or something?_

Derek scowls. No, of course not, that’s ridiculous. He doesn’t like Stiles. He’s just upset that he hurt the poor guy, is all.

 _I don’t think so,_ Cora’s voice croons. He can hear her laughing at him. _I can see right through you, dipshit. You like him. Now maybe if you’d just get your head out of your ass, you could actually apologize and maybe ask him out._

Derek shakes his head a little. Yeah, because Stiles is definitely in the mood to go on a date with him.

He can’t sit here with Stiles brooding next to him anymore. He stands quickly and walks to the bathroom, shutting the door tightly behind him. He doesn’t do anything but stand there staring at his reflection in the mirror for as long as he can before someone’s banging at the door yelling at him to get out. When he returns to his seat, Stiles is slumped against the window, still turned away but with his shoulders relaxed and his breathing smooth and even.

Derek lets out a small sigh of relief, sitting down carefully so he won’t wake him. He watches Stiles sleep for a little while, the gentle rise and fall of his chest and the slight flutter of his eyelashes, and tries to convince himself that he is definitely not in love with him. And when he can’t keep that up anymore, he settles into his seat and lets his own eyes close.

 

**2:27 PM**

 

When Derek opens his eyes, Stiles is already awake, sitting up and reading a book.

He sits up and sighs. “Stiles, I’m sorry.”

Stiles doesn’t look up – or even acknowledge him, for that matter.

He clenches his jaw. Alright, so he insulted Stiles. That doesn’t warrant flat-out pretending he doesn’t exist. It’s just fucking rude. “Stiles.”

Still nothing. Well, for fuck’s sake.

“Stiles!” Derek hisses, not wanting to shout on the small plane. “Jesus, Stiles, would you just talk to me? Look, I know I hurt your feelings, but I didn’t mean to. Everything you said was true, okay, but that was before I actually started talking to you and found out what a cool person you are.” He blows out a breath, mentally bracing himself for what he’s about to say. “I actually really like you. You’re really cool and funny, and I’ll be honest, I don’t know that much about you, but I really want to. Actually, I was wondering if you – ”

Stiles looks up then, pulling out his earbuds. “Are you talking to me?”

Derek stares at him for a moment, completely shocked. “Oh, my God.”

Stiles winces. “Yeah, I’m really sorry, I like my music loud. But hey, now that you’re awake, I just wanted to say I’m sorry about that earlier. I don’t know what I was thinking. I get it if you never wanna talk to me again.”

Derek lets out a small, breathless laugh, still stunned but a bit relieved that Stiles didn’t hear any of that. God, how embarrassing that would have been. “I was just saying I’m sorry,” he says, smiling a little. “You were right, I did think that at first. But I was wrong, and I’m sorry I hurt your feelings.”

Stiles makes a face. “You didn’t hurt my feelings,” he scoffs, sounding rather indignant. “You kidding? I think I’m a little tougher than that. Come on, Derek.”

He chuckles. “Whatever you say,” he says with a grin.

Stiles laughs, tapping his fingers on the armrest. “So, you wanna watch a movie?” he asks, looking up at him. “I have some horror movies, if that’s what you’re into. I’m kind of a horror freak.”

Derek smiles, nodding. “Yeah, that’d be cool.”

“Sweet,” Stiles says with a grin, pulling his laptop out of his bag. “This one’s a little obscure, and I don’t mean that in a hipster way.”

Derek laughs. “Whatever is fine with me.”

It really was. For an hour and forty-two minutes, Derek and Stiles watch a movie called ‘Knife to Meet You,’ and though Derek isn’t the biggest horror fan, he actually really enjoys it. This might have something to do with the fact that Stiles is incredibly fascinating to watch when a horror movie is on, the way his pupils dilate and his breathing evens out and he’s incredibly still, fixated on whatever’s happening on the screen. It’s like he becomes an entirely different person, and Derek finds it amazing to watch. God, he’s in deep.

When the movie ends, Derek shifts his eyes to the computer screen and pretends he’s been watching the whole time. “So, what’d you think?” Stiles asks with a grin.

Derek nods, laughing at the excited look on Stiles’ face. “It was good, really good.”

Stiles frowns. “Liar.”

“What?” Derek asks, afraid he’s been caught.

“I know that look. You didn’t like it at all,” Stiles accuses. “You know, you can tell me the truth. It’s not gonna kill me or anything.”

Derek lets out a breath and smiles. “Alright, horror isn’t really my cup of tea,” he says sheepishly.

"Whatever, your loss," Stiles says with a laugh.

Around them, people are stretching, gathering their things, buckling their seatbelts. “Looks like we’re gonna be landing soon,” Stiles says, putting his laptop away and stretching.

"Looks like it," Derek murmurs, his eyes catching on the strip of bared skin as Stiles’ t-shirt pulls up over his hipbones. He averts his eyes quickly, grabbing his bag and reminding himself that it’s never gonna happen.

"So, is your sister gonna be waiting for you when you get off?" Stiles asks, looking up at Derek.

"Probably," he answers, nodding a little to himself. "When she called me, she said it was pretty important. Something I really needed to see." He chuckles. "Though, knowing Cora, it’s probably not nearly as important as she – " He stops, noticing a vaguely disappointed look on Stiles’ face. "Something wrong?"

The look vanishes the moment Derek speaks, and is replaced with a tight smile. “Nah, don’t worry about it,” Stiles says, shaking his head.

Derek frowns a little, about to speak when he’s cut off by the pilot’s voice coming over the speakers. “Thank you for flying with us, folks, we’ll have you out of here in just a few minutes.”

For a few minutes, they chat idly about Cora, college, Stiles’ plans for his semester abroad, anything that will pass the time. Derek wonders about the invisible line between them that appeared sometime in the last ten minutes, but says nothing as they stand and gather their things.

They step off the plane and walk side by side, probably closer than they need to be, with shoulders brushing against each other and arms practically touching, until Derek sees Cora smiling and waving at him. Her eyebrows shoot up the moment she spots Stiles next to him. He can already hear her laughing at him for his dumb puppy love.

He stops and turns to face Stiles. “Listen – “

"You’re ditching me for your sister, I get it," Stiles says with a small chuckle. "This is the end of our little tryst. It’s fine, don’t worry about it."

He turns to leave, but Derek catches his shoulder. “No, Stiles, wait,” he says. His mouth is dry and he feels his breath coming a bit faster, and God why does Stiles have to look at him like that, with those huge brown eyes and the little quirk at his mouth. “Actually, I was wondering if you’d wanna, I don’t know, get a drink or something later?” It comes out like a goddamn question and he hates himself. Why would Stiles ever want to go on a date with him, anyway –

"Yeah, I’d love to."

Derek pauses, frowns a little. “You – really?”

Stiles laughs. “Yeah, of course I would. I’ve only been trying to flirt with you for the past nine hours, why would I turn you down?”

Derek can’t believe what he’s hearing. “Are you – shit, really?” He laughs breathlessly. “God, I’m stupid.”

"You really are," Stiles says with a smirk. He grabs a pen from his pocket and scribbles his number down on a scrap of paper. "Jesus, here. Don’t lose this, okay? I have an entire semester to bug your sister about getting you to call me." He winks, grabbing his bag and walking away.

"Smooth, Romeo," Cora says from behind him, startling Derek. She’s laughing, trying and failing to hide it behind her hand. "Hey, he’s cute. I’m proud of you, big bro." She pats him on the back, still grinning as she turns. "Alright, let’s get going. I’ve got a lot planned, and we gotta get it done fast if you’re gonna have time for your date," she says over her shoulder, already walking away.

Derek frowns at her back. “It’s not a date!” he calls indignantly, picking up his bag and hurrying after her.

"Yet!" Cora says with a laugh.

For all the times Cora’s been wrong, Derek really hopes this isn’t one of them.


End file.
